


How The Spider Caught The Fly

by afteriwake



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2017-12-03 18:02:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/701093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a darkness in him, a darkness that will be what allows him to beat Sherlock Holmes. The darkness is fundamental to his plans, and the darkness will give him the winning advantage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How The Spider Caught The Fly

**Author's Note:**

> An answer for the sherlockmas Afterglow Fest, using the poem [The Uses of Sorrow](http://letajoykeepyou.blogspot.com/2012/01/mary-oliver-on-uses-of-sorrow.html) by Mary Oliver. I don't usually write Moriarty because I don't like him much, but I hope all of you enjoy this. Set during "The Great Game."

He knew, now, that the darkness was a gift. Not the actual darkness, where the lights were out and the sky was starless and the moon was gone, but the darkness in his heart. If he didn’t have the darkness he couldn’t do what he did, and do it so well. There was no room in him for love, for compassion, for warmth. Oh, sure, he could put on an act. Acting like he had room in his heart for these things was easy, but they never reached to the core. It was simply a mask he wore, a disguise he would snap on and snap off with the greatest of ease.

It had worked with Hooper. It had been amusing, pretending to be Jim from IT, using her to get close to the great Sherlock Holmes. Oh, Sherlock was the real prize, and Hooper was just a pawn in the grand scheme of things. But he wanted to see if he could do it, if he could convince the lovesick twat to look at someone other than Sherlock. And he had pulled it off masterfully. Not for too long, but long enough. He knew by the end of their second date she had had her suspicions, and by the end of the third he knew the little game was over. The smaller fly had escaped the spider’s web, but he still had his sights on the larger, juicier fly in the center, the one who had no clue he’d stumbled into the web in the first place.

The darkness allowed him to kill without discrimination. All those people with the bombs had behaved, all except the blind woman. That particular death, and the other deaths in the building, hadn’t concerned him. The stupid old woman had broken the rules, and she had paid the price. Just because the price was her life didn’t mean much to him. After all, what was one life in the pursuit of the ultimate goal? Okay, so it had been many lives, but did it really matter? It didn’t matter to him, and that was what was important.

He had been a cruel boy, a cruel teenager, a cruel man. Maybe if things had been different he might not have gone down this road, but it was almost like he was doomed from the start. His parents had considered him a mistake, and he had known that from such an early age that it shaped his worldview at the tender age of two. To know you aren’t wanted, to have to fend for yourself by whatever means necessary, to have to make your way in the world with your wits and wiles…some make it to greatness. Some crash and burn. He had made it to greatness, of course. He had been destined to be the greatest criminal mastermind the world had ever seen, and he had never been one to disappoint.

This man he was now, this lethal man with no regards to anyone unless it suited him, this man was the only one who could take on Sherlock Holmes and win. He would beat the arrogant consulting detective at his own game. He would crush his spirit, crush his soul, and do it all with a smile on his face. After all, hadn’t Sherlock been a fan when he was but a child? Carl Powers was the start of their twisted relationship, unbeknownst to Holmes, and he would be the beginning of the end. He was the murder that tied them together, he was the significant one. Life had not been fun until the but a child Sherlock had poked his nose where it didn’t belong. Then it got interesting.

Of course, he had to wait. Waiting was the hard part, but he bided his time well, building this impenetrable empire for himself. It was a stupid line from a stupid movie, but if anyone was king of the world it was him. He had power that governments only wished they had by the time he started his assault on Sherlock Holmes. He had power and money and clout, and he had an entire organization at his fingertips that would do whatever he asked whenever he asked, however he wanted. Sherlock didn’t have that kind of power, not by a long shot. He had smarts, he’d give him that, but intellect and knowledge were not the only things that made someone powerful, and he knew that all too well.

When he started to spring his trap, when he started to move the pieces on the board to just his liking, an excitement he hadn’t felt in years sprung up in him. The darkness was getting the chance to come out, channeled through all the things that made him so great. The darkness in him was going to go to battle against the light that Sherlock represented. They were similar, though, so even Sherlock’s light was tainted with the same darkness in him. Thankfully he had snuffed out all the light in his own life long ago, and it was no concern to him now. The darkness reigned, and the darkness would will out and be what lead him down this path he chose to take.

So now this great game was afoot. This game would play out to the bitter end, and even he didn’t know how it would end. Would he be the absolute victor, and would the spider finally devour the fly in the center of the web? Would it be a draw and the spider would retreat and wait and strike again? Or would he be disappointed, and the fly would escape and the spider would end up flat beneath the heel of a shoe, dead and gone? He hoped for the former. He hoped Sherlock would be the genius he knew he was, the brilliant opponent he needed, because if he wasn’t? Then this was all a waste, and it would be best to be dead then to keep living a boring life. And he didn’t want that at all.


End file.
